The agent cinched up the little man tight in the vest and tossed him a windbreaker. He'd showered--after protesting--and had been given a set of clean clothes. The large navy blue jacket, covering the bulletproof vest, was a little lopsided but actually gave him a muscular physique. He caught sight of himself in the mirror--his scrubbed and newly attired self--and smiled for the first time since he'd been here.
"Okay," Sellitto said to two undercover officers, "take him downtown."
The officers ushered him out the door.
After he'd left, Dellray looked at Rhyme, who nodded. The lanky agent sighed and flicked open his cell phone, placed a call to Hudson Air Charters, where another agent was waiting to pick up the phone. The fed's tech group had found a remote tap on a relay box near the airport, clipped into the Hudson Air phone lines. The agents hadn't removed it, though; in fact at Rhyme's insistence they checked to make sure it was working and had replaced the weak batteries. The criminalist was relying on the device for the new trap.
On the speakerphone, several rings then a click.
"Agent Mondale," came the deep voice. Mondale wasn't Mondale and he was speaking according to a prewritten script.
"Mondale," Dellray said, sounding lily white, to a Connecticut manor born. "Agent Wilson here, we're at Lincoln's now." (Not "Rhyme"; the Dancer knew him as "Lincoln.") "How's the airport?"
"Still secure."
"Good. Listen, got a question. We've got a CI working for us, Joe D'Oforio."
"He was the one--"
"Right."
"--turned. You're working with him?"
"Yeah," said Wilson, aka Fred Dellray. "Bit of a mutt, but he's cooperating. We're going to run him down to his hidey-hole and back here."
"Where's 'here'? You mean, back to Lincoln's?"
"Right. He wants his stuff."
"Fuck you doing that for?"
"He cut a deal. He dimes this killer and Lincoln agreed he could have some stuff from his place. This old subway station . . . Anyway, we're not doing a convoy. Just one car. Reason I called, we need a good driver. You worked with somebody you liked, right?"
"Driver?"
"On the Gambino thing?"
"Oh, yeah . . . Lemme think."
They stretched it out. Rhyme was, as always, impressed with Dellray's performance. Whoever he wanted to be, he was.
The phony agent Mondale--who deserved a best-supporting award himself--said, "I remember. Tony Glidden. No, Tommy. The blond guy, right?"
"That's him. I want to use him. He around?"
"Naw. He's in Phillie. That carjacking sting."
"Phillie. Too bad. We're going in about twenty minutes. Can't wait any longer than that. Well, I'll just do it myself then. But that Tommy. He--"
"Fucker could drive a car! He could lose a tail in two blocks. Man was amazing."
"Sure could use him now. Listen, thanks, Mondale."
"Later."
Rhyme winked, a quad's equivalent of applause. Dellray hung up, exhaled long and slow. "We'll see. We'll see."
Sellitto uttered an optimistic "The third time we're baiting him. This should be it."